I can understand why most people wouldn't think so. I'm not here to tell you your opinion is wrong. I'm not even really here to try and change your mind on the matter. I'm simply going to say, I love the Saboteur. He's fun, and effective the way I use him. And now I'm going to go into why I think so. Because that's rather important.
First of all, my build:
http://narida.pytalh...enadeCapacity5/
(I personally pair Armor-Piercing IV rounds with this setup, but you can do whatever you wish, though I heavily suggest using AP)
You'll notice I don't take Fitness. Well, to put it bluntly, it really doesn't do anything that a Cyclonic Mod III or IV can't do, plus it takes away from valuable points from other abilities, which are all vital to his success.
Basically, the deal is this: he's a Combat Engineer. Meaning, he uses tech powers alongside weapons to deal his damage with utmost efficiency. It's hard to find a good weapon that meshes well with his character, but I have found the Argus Assault Rifle to fit this to a tee. The Saboteur is a close- to mid-range fighter. Meaning, you should never be far away from whatever you're trying to attack. Stay moderately close. The Argus lets you do this while still packing a hell of a punch (more details later). I pack the Acolyte as a sidearm in case I need to strip some shields off a big guy.
Also worth noting, is that the Saboteur more or less runs on two gears: he is either on Crowd Control and Elimination, or on Slow and Steady. What this means is, he can actually eliminate any given target really quickly, but this method (which will be indirectly explained later) can be a bit risky. If you're entering a high-risk situation (i.e. last man standing, two Banshees, one Marauder and one Brute are still on the map), you can easily fight in a way where the enemy won't even have a chance to significantly damage you, but it might take you a bit longer than it should to win. But you will win. It's kinda like having an interchangeable Collector Adept and Geth Juggernaut, albeit different in execution.
Now, to go into specifics:
I. Argus Assault Rifle: As I said in the brief summary, this is a close-to-mid-range weapon. The Argus, even on Gold, is very powerful. I use the Extended Barrel for even more damage (~376 per shot, and it fires three rounds at once). The Stability Damper might seem an odd choice to those unfamiliar with the Argus. Well, basically, it's this: the Argus KICKS. So much. Even if you have that Stability Damper on, it will still kick. If you take it off and put it on a Turian, it will still kick. Combine the two though? Perfect. The gun is beautiful. And best of all, it will keep you in range of your targets.
II. Acolyte Heavy Pistol: Okay, so it has ULM on it. I don't really expect anyone to agree with that decision, given how light the gun already is. I put it on there because I can feel the difference between a 3.57 sec cooldown in comparison to a 3.70 sec cooldown, and I don't like it. But that's beside the point. Since it already does my job cleanly as is (takes very few shots to strip a Banshee's barriers), I went ahead and also added a Power Magnifier onto it. You should primarily be sticking to the Argus, but when you do have the Acolyte equipped, you'll get a nice boost to your damage output. Nice.
III. Sentry Turret: So its base damage with this build is 153.75 damage per shot of a triple burst that occurs once every few seconds. So every burst, that little pew pew cannon does 461.25 damage. [sarcasm] Oh, I bet you're really impressed now! [/sarcasm] Well, this damage doubles for armor. 307.5 damage per shot (NOTE: CYONAN HAS TOLD ME THIS SUFFERS FROM ARMOR DAMAGE MITIGATION, so on Gold it's really more like 257.5 damage per shot) against armor equates to 922.5 damage per burst. Better? In addition, between bursts it shoots a rocket that does 615 damage against normal targets and 1230 damage against armored targets. So each full burst does 1076.25 to normal targets and 2152.5 to armored targets.
Still, that's not exactly a whole ton. But consider this: how often do you have to cast Sentry Turret? When you throw your Turret out, you're only exposed for all of a second. Then it's firing, and you're firing. You don't throw it out and just sit there. It's not your only form of damage. It merely adds more onto what you're already doing. And it adds on a considerable amount.
It has utility, too. You can throw it around corners to soften up targets before you can even get there yourself. And that Rocket has two nifty functions. The first is that it can potentially stun a target. The second is that it detonates Tech Bursts. That's right. That Rocket is capable of detonating Tech Bursts. If you're on a techie team this is invaluable.
In short: of course it sucks if you just leave it there. And... yeah, it's still a bit subpar, but it still does its job admirably. You have no idea how many Dragoons and Brutes this thing has saved me from.
IV. Sabotage: This skill is actually much more useful than it lets on, thanks to its Backfire function. On organic targets, Backfire does 487.5 (975 to shielded targets) damage once it activates, as well as primes for Tech Bursts. Now, that damage might not seem like much. Well... powers by themselves were never really well-known for doing much damage just on their own. Only a few powers actually do such things. Like, let's take Snap Freeze (the Paladin's. The AIU's Tactical Cheat is a bad example because Infiltrator). Using this build, I can do 617.5 points of damage every 2.61 seconds. Cool. Well, my Reegar Carbine X can do over 2000 damage every second to armored targets, and it has a negative multiplier against them. In the time it takes to recharge Snap Freeze I could have done over 5000 damage, which I would have had to interrupt to do... 617.5? So why use Snap Freeze? Is it because it has other utilities? That's precisely why.
Sabotage is rather unique. It's one of the few skills in the game that can stun twice per cast. On top of nearly 1000 damage to shields, this makes for a perfect break in between Argus bursts. Fire, Sabotage, stun, Fire, Backfire, stun, Fire, repeat. That's a pretty beautiful combination. And like I said before, that Backfire function primes for Tech Bursts, which can be detonated by Rocket Turret or Homing Grenades. Backfire doesn't work on synthetic targets, but it has a rather nifty function against them, which you should know. Let's just say, hacking a Cerberus Turret or Geth Pyro is a pretty wise option.
V. Homing Grenade: Okay, so I'll be the first to say, it has a rather sluggish travel time. However, unless you're doing it wrong, you shouldn't be that far away from the target anyway, which means the HGs should still get to the enemy pretty quickly. And when they do, they'll do rather handy amounts of damage. However, even with that this would still be a rather annoying issue. So what do you do? Take Split Grenade. You can cast it into midair and it'll still usually manage to find a target because of the way it tracks. It can hit two separate targets, and if you take the Burning Damage it'll also make some enemies start panicking. If it doesn't though? They'll still stagger back. BOTH enemies.
Also, Homing Grenade can detonate Tech Bursts, which you can set up with Sabotage's Backfire function. Nifty!
Final Notes: If you play it right (and assuming Homing Grenade and Rocket Turret aren't being rebellious) you can have four enemies stunlocked at once. Keep in mind, there are only eight enemies on the map at any given time. To put it bluntly, you alone can turn half the map into a joke.
TL;DR: Is he an Infiltrator? No. Is he a TSol? No. Is he a Kroguard? No. But is he a bad class? Far from it. At least, to me. Several BSNers have seen me play him by now, and they all seemed rather impressed. If he's not your cup of tea, then that's okay. If you want to go on thinking he's bad, then that's okay too. But at least try him this way before you resign yourself to this opinion. Because I was actually rather impressed by how effective it was. And I think you will be, too. (and while you're at it, check out Pyroninja42's Destroyer Shocktrooper build, as that's pretty damn good, too, as I was pleasantly surprised to learn.)
TTL;DRITL;DR: He's good. Just rather awkward to work with. And I think this is what gets most people.
Modifié par DullahansXMark, 04 avril 2013 - 10:49 .
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